Kim O'Hara wrote:I have told you repeatedly why it it not useful or relevant and you can't or won't answer those points but you ...

Climate does not have to favor humans, dinosaurs, bacteria, plants or whatever. It is what it is, it was before us and it will be on the planet after us. We are historically irrelevant to Earth considering geological timespans.

I don't think that it is fair to compare current co2/temp levels to extremely low point in Earth's history rather than to more USUAL average.

1 million (or so) sidestep in that chart is not too big considering that it shows 600 million years of data.1 million from 4.5 billion years is 0.022...%10 million compared to 4.5 billion years is 0.22...%

Just like we cannot judge the trend of a football game by 1/100th of second, same with humans unless you answer three points in my post above.

Kim O'Hara wrote:This time I tracked it down to its source instead - a franklydenialist blog by one Paul MacRae, who introduces himself thus:

My name is Paul MacRae. I’m an ex-journalist who has worked as an editor, editorial writer and columnist for several newspapers over the past 40 years, including The Toronto Star, Globe and Mail, Bangkok Post, and Victoria Times Colonist.

As long as the data is correct, I don't care who (Muslim, Christian, Scientist, Non Scientist, Oil & gas executive, AGW proponent, etc) drew it. I am interested in argument itself, not the source who said it.

"Life is a struggle. Life will throw curveballs at you, it will humble you, it will attempt to break you down. And just when you think things are starting to look up, life will smack you back down with ruthless indifference..."

Of course climate changes, and has been doing so for 4.5 Billion years. A commander could make serious mistakes if he didn't take climate and other factors into consideration.

I didn't see in the article any mention of human caused climate change. It was just about Australian commanders considering climate change and its implications for defense purposes and such.

Bad events can happen in cold weather. Bad events can happen in hot weather.Climate change can be a threat, and so is aging and death is threat to us all. Samsara is not a perfect place and will never be.

"Life is a struggle. Life will throw curveballs at you, it will humble you, it will attempt to break you down. And just when you think things are starting to look up, life will smack you back down with ruthless indifference..."

Alex123 wrote:As long as the data is correct, I don't care who (Muslim, Christian, Scientist, Non Scientist, Oil & gas executive, AGW proponent, etc) drew it. I am interested in argument itself, not the source who said it.

So you would accept the authority of a back-yard mechanic over the authority of a doctor when it came to diagnosing your cracked rib?And you would accept the authority of Sarah Palin over the authority of Bhikku Bodhi when it came to explaining the finer points of dependent origination?And you would accept your local court reported as your attorney when you were hauled before the court for trashing your local Macca's in a drunken frenzy? (It's okay, I know you didn't do it but someone mis-identified you)

Kim O'Hara wrote:Just about every aspect of modern climatology is affected by AGW. Numbers will depend on your definition of "climatologist". 1200 volunteered to contribute to the latest IPCC report (see http://www.ipcc-wg2.gov/AR5/ar5.html) and they would have been among the most highly qualified ... give each of them a half a dozen junior staff and half a dozen post-grad students and a dozen undergrad students and you're in the right ballpark.Kim

Hold on. Looking at the chapter summaries of the working groups, the vast majority of the work is not concerned with the crux of the issue--what are the cause(s) of recent warming, and will it continue in the future, and to what extent. Impacts on Agriculture in Africa, say, doesn't call on quite the same expertise, nor need it be controversial in the way the main issue is. And if a research team that projects warming into the future relies on the work of a research team that worked on the methodology of using tree ring cores to generate historical temperatures, or whatnot, it is still the first team that gets counted as relevant climatologists for our purposes.

Kim O'Hara wrote:14 000 scientific papers in 20 years (rounding off a bit since we're not going to be very accurate anyway). That's 3500 per year.Assume each researcher publishes 5 papers per year (which I think is fairly reasonable), and you get 700 researchers.But 2 - 5 authors per paper is pretty normal. Call the average 2 to be on the low side and you have 1400 researchers getting published; call it three and you have 2100. Then add in the postgrad students, the undergrads if you like ...

The point that you will not take is that it is a small fraction of those papers that are even attempting to make a case for AGW. And yet they all get added together to build the big rhetorical club: "why you think your own knowledge, your own research and your own "found it on the internet" factoids outweigh the combined research of thousands of fully trained, hardworking and conscientious climatologists". Push just a little bit on the "thousands" and it turns out to be an assumption (to put it charitably). I'm guessing the valorizing attributions "fully trained", "hardworking", and "conscientious" are likewise pulled out of...the air, let's say.

Kim O'Hara wrote:I'm happy to let my "thousands" stand. If you want to disagree, show me some evidence for your position and I will happily defer to the truth.

I want you to be happy. So while it is evident that neither one of knows, I'll join you in letting your "thousands" stand, wobbly legged, like a newborn colt.Paul J.

Just keep breathing in and out like this. Don't be interested in anything else. It doesn't matter even if someone is standing on their head with their ass in the air. Don't pay it any attention. Just stay with the in-breath and the out-breath. Concentrate your awareness on the breath. Just keep doing it. http://www.ajahnchah.org/book/Just_Do_It_1_2.php

Alex123 wrote:As long as the data is correct, I don't care who (Muslim, Christian, Scientist, Non Scientist, Oil & gas executive, AGW proponent, etc) drew it. I am interested in argument itself, not the source who said it.

So you would accept the authority of a back-yard mechanic over the authority of a doctor when it came to diagnosing your cracked rib?And you would accept the authority of Sarah Palin over the authority of Bhikku Bodhi when it came to explaining the finer points of dependent origination?And you would accept your local court reported as your attorney when you were hauled before the court for trashing your local Macca's in a drunken frenzy? (It's okay, I know you didn't do it but someone mis-identified you)

Kim

Dear Kim,

I accept valid arguments and reject invalid arguments. As I've said, I don't care who (Journalist, AGW proponent, Oil & Gas executive, Christian, Muslim, etc) gave data, as long as it is correct data. Ad hominem is not an argument.

If an argument is proper, I don't care who vocally said it or written it, as long as argument is proper.

Here I don't accept authority, just the data.

"Life is a struggle. Life will throw curveballs at you, it will humble you, it will attempt to break you down. And just when you think things are starting to look up, life will smack you back down with ruthless indifference..."

Last edited by Alex123 on Mon Mar 25, 2013 3:50 pm, edited 1 time in total.

"Life is a struggle. Life will throw curveballs at you, it will humble you, it will attempt to break you down. And just when you think things are starting to look up, life will smack you back down with ruthless indifference..."

porpoise wrote:If the majority scientific view is that we need to reduce carbon emissions, then isn't it reasonable that governments should follow this advice?

I am all for cleaner, greener environment. I am all for curbing excess consumption and useless waste.

"Life is a struggle. Life will throw curveballs at you, it will humble you, it will attempt to break you down. And just when you think things are starting to look up, life will smack you back down with ruthless indifference..."

He who knows only his own side of the case knows little of that. His reasons may be good, and no one may have been able to refute them. But if he is equally unable to refute the reasons on the opposite side, if he does not so much as know what they are, he has no ground for preferring either opinion … ...He must be able to hear them from persons who actually believe them … he must know them in their most plausible and persuasive form.John Stuart Mill

What is your evidence (please cite sources) for accepting the authority non-climate scientists over the authority of climate scientists? Again, I am not asking you to rehash your interpretation of the data, just the reasons you accept one persons authority over the other.

I go by evidence and data, not who (journalist, christian, muslim, climate scientist, Oil & Gas executive, etc) said it.

You obviously care something about who says what, because you are giving more weight to the interpretations of non-climateologists over the interpretations of climatologists. So again, why do you trust non-climate scientists more than you trust climate scientists?

"For a disciple who has conviction in the Teacher's message & lives to penetrate it, what accords with the Dhamma is this:'The Blessed One is the Teacher, I am a disciple. He is the one who knows, not I." - MN. 70 Kitagiri Sutta

Buckwheat wrote:You obviously care something about who says what, because you are giving more weight to the interpretations of non-climateologists over the interpretations of climatologists.

I consider the data that I have. I don't care if Muslim, Xtian, Journalist or AGW proponent has said it.

I am interested in data that is LONG term rather than selective and short term. I am interested in what comes first, temperature change or CO2 change. Ice core data shows that temperature changes first.

Great, so catastrophic predictions are uncertain and how long will global warming continue is uncertain. Hopefully it will be high enough to prevent Ice Age.

Your own sources tell us that their predictions are UNCERTAIN, and yet you believe that they are certain about future level of global warming?!!!

"Life is a struggle. Life will throw curveballs at you, it will humble you, it will attempt to break you down. And just when you think things are starting to look up, life will smack you back down with ruthless indifference..."

You are right, I just realized I never properly addressed this evidence. I appologize that it got lost in the cycle of redundancy. So here I go.

Ice Core Studies Prove CO2 Is Not the Powerful Climate Driver Climate Alarmists Make It Out to BeVolume 6, Number 26: 25 June 2003

For the past two decades or more, we have heard much about the global warming of the 20th century being caused by the rise in atmospheric carbon dioxide concentration that is generally attributed to anthropogenic CO2 emissions. This story, however, has always been controversial [see Smagorinsky et al. (1982) and Idso (1982) for early pro/con positions on the issue]; and with the retrieval and preliminary analysis of the first long ice core from Vostok, Antarctica -- which provided a 150,000-year history of both surface air temperature and atmospheric CO2 concentration -- the debate became even more intense, as the close associations of the ups and downs of atmospheric CO2 and temperature that were evident during glacial terminations and inceptions in that record, as well as in subsequent records of even greater length, led many climate alarmists to claim that those observations actually proved that anthropogenic CO2 emissions were responsible for 20th-century global warming.

This contention was challenged by Idso (1989), who wrote -- in reference to the very data that were used to support the claim -- that "changes in atmospheric CO2 content never precede changes in air temperature, when going from glacial to interglacial conditions; and when going from interglacial to glacial conditions, the change in CO2 concentration actually lags the change in air temperature (Genthon et al., 1987)." Hence, he concluded that "changes in CO2 concentration cannot be claimed to be the cause of changes in air temperature, for the appropriate sequence of events (temperature change following CO2 change) is not only never present, it is actually violated in [at least] half of the record (Idso, 1988)."

How has our understanding of this issue progressed in the interim? Our website provides several updates.

Petit et al. (1999) reconstructed histories of surface air temperature and atmospheric CO2 concentration from data obtained from a Vostok ice core that covered the prior 420,000 years, determining that during glacial inception "the CO2 decrease lags the temperature decrease by several thousand years" and that "the same sequence of climate forcing operated during each termination." Likewise, working with sections of ice core records from around the times of the last three glacial terminations, Fischer et al. (1999) found that "the time lag of the rise in CO2 concentrations with respect to temperature change is on the order of 400 to 1000 years during all three glacial-interglacial transitions."

On the basis of atmospheric CO2 data obtained from the Antarctic Taylor Dome ice core and temperature data obtained from the Vostok ice core, Indermuhle et al. (2000) studied the relationship between these two parameters over the period 60,000-20,000 years BP (Before Present). One statistical test performed on the data suggested that shifts in the air's CO2 content lagged shifts in air temperature by approximately 900 years, while a second statistical test yielded a mean lag-time of 1200 years. Similarly, in a study of air temperature and CO2 data obtained from Dome Concordia, Antarctica for the period 22,000-9,000 BP -- which time interval includes the most recent glacial-to-interglacial transition -- Monnin et al. (2001) found that the start of the CO2 increase lagged the start of the temperature increase by 800 years. Then, in another study of the 420,000-year Vostok ice-core record, Mudelsee (2001) concluded that variations in atmospheric CO2 concentration lagged variations in air temperature by 1,300 to 5,000 years.

In a somewhat different type of study, Yokoyama et al. (2000) analyzed sediment facies in the tectonically stable Bonaparte Gulf of Australia to determine the timing of the initial melting phase of the last great ice age. In commenting on the results of that study, Clark and Mix (2000) note that the rapid rise in sea level caused by the melting of land-based ice that began approximately 19,000 years ago preceded the post-glacial rise in atmospheric CO2 concentration by about 3,000 years.

So what's the latest on the issue? To our knowledge, the most recent study to broach the subject is that of Caillon et al. (2003), who measured the isotopic composition of argon -- specifically, ð40Ar, which they argue "can be taken as a climate proxy, thus providing constraints about the timing of CO2 and climate change" -- in air bubbles in the Vostok ice core over the period that comprises what is called Glacial Termination III, which occurred about 240,000 years BP. The results of their tedious but meticulous analysis led them to ultimately conclude that "the CO2 increase lagged Antarctic deglacial warming by 800 ± 200 years."

Everything up to this point is OK, basically saying that in the past warming and cooling events, CO2 levels lag behind temperature changes. There is no statement of what causes the warming/cooling. Only repeatedly stating that CO2 lags temperature.

Now comes the red herring:

This finding, in the words of Caillon et al., "confirms that CO2 is not the forcing that initially drives the climatic system during a deglaciation."

Who is saying that CO2 was the forcing that intially drives the climatic system during a deglaciation? Quite the contrary, climate scientists point to a known forcing (changes to Earth's orbit) with a known magnitude that would cause enough warming to trigger CO2 feedbacks. However, that forcing is not strong enough to account for the entire deglaciation event.

Nevertheless, they and many others continue to hold to the view that the subsequent increase in atmospheric CO2 -- which is believed to be due to warming-induced CO2 outgassing from the world's oceans -- serves to amplify the warming that is caused by whatever prompts the temperature to rise in the first place.

This part is nearly accurate, except that "whatever" prompts the temperature to rise is not a whatever... It is a specific phenomena with a specific forcing magnitude (changes in Earth's orbit).

This belief, however, is founded on unproven assumptions about the strength of CO2-induced warming

The amount of warming caused by the anthropogenic increase in atmospheric CO2 may be one of the most misunderstood subjects in climate science. Many people think the anthropogenic warming can't be quantified, many others think it must be an insignificant amount. However, climate scientists have indeed quantified the anthropogenic contribution to global warming using empirical observations and fundamental physical equations.

And back to your article:

and is applied without any regard for biologically-induced negative climate feedbacks that may occur in response to atmospheric CO2 enrichment. Also, there is no way to objectively determine the strength of the proposed amplification from the ice core data.

CO2 feedback sure fits the data quite well. Has there been any other proposal? This ice core data is not the only indicator that CO2 affects climate (see above quote from skeptical science.)[/quote]

I did not have the time/expertise/resources required to verify the sources in this article. I will have to assume they are fairly reliable.

And the counter argument from climate scientists:

http://skepticalscience.com wrote:The skeptic argument...

CO2 lags temperature"An article in Science magazine illustrated that a rise in carbon dioxide did not precede a rise in temperatures, but actually lagged behind temperature rises by 200 to 1000 years. A rise in carbon dioxide levels could not have caused a rise in temperature if it followed the temperature." (Joe Barton)

What the science says...

When the Earth comes out of an ice age, the warming is not initiated by CO2 but by changes in the Earth's orbit. The warming causes the oceans to release CO2. The CO2 amplifies the warming and mixes through the atmosphere, spreading warming throughout the planet. So CO2 causes warming AND rising temperature causes CO2 rise. Overall, about 90% of the global warming occurs after the CO2 increase.

Over the last half million years, our climate has experienced long ice ages regularly punctuated by brief warm periods called interglacials. Atmospheric carbon dioxide closely matches the cycle, increasing by around 80 to 100 parts per million as Antarctic temperatures warm up to 10°C. However, when you look closer, CO2 actually lags Antarctic temperature changes by around 1,000 years. While this result was predicted two decades ago (Lorius 1990), it still surprises and confuses many. Does warming cause CO2 rise or the other way around? In actuality, the answer is both.

Interglacials come along approximately every 100,000 years. This is called the Milankovitch cycle, brought on by changes in the Earth's orbit. There are three main changes to the earth's orbit. The shape of the Earth's orbit around the sun (eccentricity) varies between an ellipse to a more circular shape. The earth's axis is tilted relative to the sun at around 23°. This tilt oscillates between 22.5° and 24.5° (oblithis quity). As the earth spins around it's axis, the axis wobbles from pointing towards the North Star to pointing at the star Vega (precession).

Figure 2: The three main orbital variations. Eccentricity: changes in the shape of the Earth’s orbit.Obliquity: changes in the tilt of the Earth’s rotational axis. Precession: wobbles in the Earth’s rotational axis.

The combined effect of these orbital cycles causes long term changes in the amount of sunlight hitting the earth at different seasons, particularly at high latitudes. For example, the orbital cycles triggered warming at high latitutdes approximately 19,000 years ago, causing large amounts of ice to melt, flooding the oceans with fresh water. This influx of fresh water then disrupted the Atlantic meridional overturning circulation (AMOC), in turn causing a seesawing of heat between the hemispheres (Shakun 2012). The Southern Hemisphere and its oceans warmed first, starting about 18,000 years ago. As the Southern Ocean warms, the solubility of CO2 in water falls (Martin 2005). This causes the oceans to give up more CO2, emitting it into the atmosphere. The exact mechanism of how the deep ocean gives up its CO2 is not fully understood but believed to be related to vertical ocean mixing (Toggweiler 1999).

The outgassing of CO2 from the ocean has several effects. The increased CO2 in the atmosphere amplifies the original warming. The relatively weak forcing from Milankovitch cycles is insufficient to cause the dramatic temperature change taking our climate out of an ice age (this period is called a deglaciation). However, the amplifying effect of CO2 is consistent with the observed warming.

CO2 from the Southern Ocean also mixes through the atmosphere, spreading the warming north (Cuffey 2001). Tropical marine sediments record warming in the tropics around 1000 years after Antarctic warming, around the same time as the CO2 rise (Stott 2007). Ice cores in Greenland find that warming in the Northern Hemisphere lags the Antarctic CO2 rise (Caillon 2003).

To claim that the CO2 lag disproves the warming effect of CO2 displays a lack of understanding of the processes that drive Milankovitch cycles. A review of the peer reviewed research into past periods of deglaciation tells us several things:

Deglaciation is not initiated by CO2 but by orbital cyclesCO2 amplifies the warming which cannot be explained by orbital cycles aloneCO2 spreads warming throughout the planetOverall, more than 90% of the glacial-interglacial warming occurs after the atmospheric CO2 increase (Figure 3).

Your own sources tell us that their predictions are UNCERTAIN, and yet you believe that they are certain about future level of global warming?!!!

There is not a single thing in science that does not contain uncertainty. The beautiful thing about science is that uncertainty gets quantified. The uncertainty here is that, assuming we continue spouting CO2 into the atmosphere unchecked, the future will either be very difficult or we will simply go extinct. The reason I included that link was to show that predictions are not for the Earth to suddenly explode, but that the difficulties can be studied, quantified, and through mitigation and adaptation we can live through this. If we do nothing, we might have to get really, really good at fasting.

(Edited for spelling)

Last edited by Buckwheat on Mon Mar 25, 2013 11:14 pm, edited 1 time in total.

Buckwheat wrote:Everything up to this point is OK, basically saying that in the past warming and cooling events, CO2 levels lag behind temperature changes. There is no statement of what causes the warming/cooling. Only repeatedly stating that CO2 lags temperature.

So if CO2 occurs well after (400-1200 years) temperature changes then something else caused and or amplified that warming that occurred 400-1200 years ago. Biggest factor in the increase in current CO2 rise would be due to causes in813AD-1613AD . Medieval WARM period occurred between 950 to 1250...

Notice similarity in dates 813-1613AD and 950-1250AD. It fits perfectly! Temperature ROSE in 950AD to 1250AD being primary cause of current (up to 2013) increases in CO2.

Buckwheat wrote:Who is saying that CO2 was the forcing that intially drives the climatic system during a deglaciation? Quite the contrary, climate scientists point to a known forcing (changes to Earth's orbit) with a known magnitude that would cause enough warming to trigger CO2 feedbacks. However, that forcing is not strong enough to account for the entire deglaciation event.

So Earth's orbit (and I assume sun activity as well) are primary mechanisms that warm up the Earth and then 400-1200 years later CO2 is produced as a result.

Lets think about it. How can CO2 which occurs much later as an effect affect Temperature? Wouldn't this contradict the statement that CO2 lags temperature changes? It lags temperature changes, it doesn't affect those temperature changes.

Why that despite great increases or decreases of CO2 during Cambrian and other period, the Earth's average temperature remained at approximately the same 23C? Doesn't it suggest that there is, at best, a temperature ceiling that is not exceeded? Even if CO2 which lags temperature change by 400-1200 has some warming properties, maybe the strength of the warming doesn't go above Global Average of 23C as an average?

During the interglacials, one of which we are in now, the climate warmed to more or less present-day temperatures link

Considering how little CO2 humans release into atmosphere (we btw, don't produce new Carbon chemical. We release natural carbon stores into an atmosphere), and considering that nature can also remove CO2 from atmosphere, what proof that our contribution are above noise?

Any other parts to discuss in this topic?

Last edited by Alex123 on Mon Mar 25, 2013 11:27 pm, edited 2 times in total.

"Life is a struggle. Life will throw curveballs at you, it will humble you, it will attempt to break you down. And just when you think things are starting to look up, life will smack you back down with ruthless indifference..."